Make your New Year's Resolution about your finances

I know there are some who think Medicare is "free" healthcare, and believe all Americans should have it rather than the ragged, poorly thought out and sketchy Obamacare (these unnamed would be Democrats/Progressives) or private insurance. But it's not free. First, all my working years I paid into it (I'm not eligible for Social Security, although I did pay into it in a number of non-state jobs, so there's a special deduction for state employees). Second, I get a "Medicare reimbursement" with my monthly pension, which is then taxed. My "free" health insurance costs over 13% of a very small pension.  If I were single, or even if I hadn't invested 15% of my income in addition to my pension deduction every month I worked, I would be in desperate circumstances. Many women my age had a shorter work career, at a lower salary range due to career choices, and will be single longer than men. So make your New Year's resolution to put more into retirement. You'll need it for your health insurance, which by then will be single payer government owned, and horribly expensive.

According to the work of Harvard University's Malcolm Sparrow, fraud could account for as much as 20 percent of total federal health care spending, which would be considerably higher than what the government's figures indicate.

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/merrillmatthews/2012/05/31/medicare-and-medicaid-fraud-is-costing-taxpayers 

 

 http://www.cato.org/publications/congressional-testimony/waste-fraud-abuse-government-health-care